All Overwatch PTR Patch Notes - 2020
All the Overwatch PTR Patch Notes released by Blizzard in 2020. I will update this list over time as soon as proper info for each patch is provided.
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December 16
NEW MAP: KANEZAKA
Kanezaka, nestled beside Hanamura, is our newest Free-For-All Map!
Fight for your life in a thrilling battlefield of alleyways, ancient stone, towering steel, and cat cafes. Shatter your enemy's dreams in the pottery shop, deliver beatdowns in the Tora no Sumika nightclub, or rise above the competition in the tower at the center of the city.
GENERAL UPDATES
Feature Update: Replay Viewer Custom Spectator Options
Added Detached Timecode UI option to Replay Viewer
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug that caused the mouse cursor to remain focused on the game client while in windowed or windowed fullscreen mode
Fixed a bug with the end of round screen for Deathmatch that would exclude players who left when the match ends
Heroes
Doomfist
Fixed a bug with the "One Punch" highlight intro that would cause it to clip into the ground on certain maps
November 19
GENERAL UPDATES
New Feature: Priority Pass
In an effort to help address the population imbalance between Tank, Support, and Damage roles, and the longer queue times that Damage players often encounter due to this imbalance, we’re introducing the new Priority Pass feature. Players can earn Priority Passes by choosing Flex when they queue, with more passes earned for wins than for losses. Use a Priority Pass to decrease queue time for a role currently experiencing higher traffic.
Priority Passes may not be used when playing a group of 5 or more. Since we try to pair large parties against other large parties, and parties this large already contain a good balance of roles, we do not anticipate that using a Priority Pass would actually reduce queue times. As such, we don’t want players to waste their passes if this wouldn’t have a noticeable effect towards the feature’s goal.
Feature Update: Replay Viewer Custom Spectator Options
We have added a new options menu to the Replay Viewer, accessible via the Media Controls. Our goal is to grant our players more control over how the Replay Viewer looks and behaves in order to navigate replays more easily, as well as make awesome content. These additional settings include the ability to independently toggle UI elements, modify player outline strength, disable objective capture sounds, and adjust the spectator camera behavior. We've also added 0.75x and 1.75x playback speeds to give you finer control.
New Options:
Team 1 Banner
Team 1 Heroes
Team 2 Banner
Team 2 Heroes
Status Messages
Playback Indicators
Game Mode Specific HUD
Kill Feed
Player Names
Player Health Bars
Player Outline Strength
First-Person Health
First-Person Ultimate Meter
First-Person Ability and Weapon Info
First-Person Crosshair
First-Person Hero HUD
First-Person Activity Feed
Objective Capture Sounds
Time Skip Interval Length
FOV Change Per Zoom
FOV Interpolation Rate
Maximum Free Camera FOV
WORKSHOP UPDATES
New Workshop Features
[PC-Only] Inspector Log File
When the setting Enable Workshop Inspector Log File [PC-ONLY] is enabled, any log entries written to the Inspector Log will be written out to a local file on disk. When the custom game ends (or if you disconnect), the current log file will close. A new log file will be opened each time you are in a new custom game that writes out a log line via Log To Inspector.
New Workshop Values
String Slice
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug that caused the "default to friends" option on the competitive leaderboards to not persist between game sessions
Heroes
Baptiste
Fixed a bug that resulted in his left forearm animating incorrectly during his Scout emote
D.Va
Fixed a bug that would allow D.Va to use Call Mech immediately after ejecting from her mech in rare conditions
Echo
Fixed a bug that would fail to force Echo out of an ult during end of round causing her to become stuck in the previous spawn point
Sigma
Fixed a bug with his Medal victory pose that would cause him to clip into allies during specific victory lineups
Widowmaker
Fixed a bug that caused her to spawn with an abnormal amount of health
Wrecking Ball
Fixed a bug that caused the camera to appear beneath the ground if Wrecking Ball shifts into ball mode while his model is still loading
October 28
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug that would cause colorblind friendly names for duel and elimination game modes to not appear properly
Heroes
Sombra
Fixed a rare bug where Sombra's translocator could be on cooldown after use if it was shot at the same time it was used
Fixed a bug that would cause Sombra to not receive a detect notification when being seen or receive a detect notification without being seen by an enemy
Workshop
Fixed a bug where Workshop Setting Combo failed to paste when using the non-default option
Fixed a bug where presets/codes would fail to import when created using older versions of Workshop Setting Int/Real/Toggle
Fixed a bug where Player Stat and Player Hero Stat would not work in the Conditions of a Rule
Fixed a bug where having a high number of dormant Conditions and Actions would have a worse impact on server load than usual
Fixed a bug where an expensive Condition in a Wait Until action could continue to affect server load after the action finished
Fixed a bug where multiple Start Camera or Start Facing actions on the same player could interfere with each other, causing some not to work
Fixed a bug that caused Sombra to not be detected properly when scaled over twice as large
October 23
HERO UPDATES
BAPTISTE
Baptiste’s Amplification Matrix was sometimes difficult to utilize for his allies without gathering very closely together so we've made it much wider.
Amplification Matrix
Width increased from 5 to 9 meters
LÚCIO
Wall Ride
Crouch no longer stops Wall Ride if not using the "Jump on Release" option
When using the "Wall Jump on Release" option, after crouching, releasing jump within 0.2 seconds will provide a jump boost (Jump release timing is consistent with live server Jump re-press timing)
BUG FIXES
Workshop
Fixed a bug where the Evaluate Once value would not work correctly for a player for certain action types if the actions occurred before the player connected to the server
Fixed a bug where the old Cancel Contrary Motion option in the Apply Impulse action behaved similarly to the new Cancel Contrary Motion XYZ option
Fixed inconsistencies with how the String Slice, String Length, and String Contains values dealt with icons
Fixed a bug where projectiles and abilities would not collide correctly with the walls of the Workshop Green Screen map
October 20
GENERAL UPDATES
Feature Update: Minimum Latency Support
Competition is at its best when it's fair. Historically, we've run tournament events like the Overwatch League and the Overwatch World Cup with teams competing head to head, in person, with local servers to provide the lowest possible latency and the best player experience.
In today's world, with so many events and tournaments moving online and teams spread across the world, we wanted to provide a mechanism to ensure that the experience is as fair as possible, regardless of how close the teams are to the tournament's servers.
The Minimum Latency option sets a target latency for Custom Games, leveling the playing field between competitors whether they're 50 or 500 miles away. Players with latency lower than the minimum setting will automatically have their network traffic delayed to meet the minimum target, while players with latency higher than the target won't have any additional delay introduced.
This feature is designed to work with a variety of network conditions, and will generally keep players within 8 milliseconds of the target setting.
We hope this feature will be useful, especially for community-driven competitions that want to Play Nice, Play Fair.
CUSTOM GAMES UPDATES
New Custom Game Maps
Workshop Green Screen
HERO UPDATES
LÚCIO
Wall Ride
By default, Lúcio will now perform his wall jump boost immediately upon releasing Jump to leave the wall, instead of requiring a second Jump press immediately after leaving the wall
Lúcio can now also drop out of wall rides by pressing Crouch, which will not trigger the automatic jump
This new setting appears inside Lucio's settings page as "Wall Jump On Release"
WRECKING BALL
Grappling Claw
Improved target detection to help with the consistency of connecting to walls
WORKSHOP UPDATES
General
Increased max Workshop Element Count to 32768
Added Type field to Start Forcing Player Outlines
Added Spray options to Communicate, Is Communicating, and Is Communicating Any
Added Sort Order field to Workshop Settings Values and increased the max Workshop Settings Count to 128
Allow Button, Disallow Button, Press Button, Start Holding Button, Stop Holding Button, and Is Holding Button now accept Button Values
Create Beam Effect, Create Effect, Create HUD Text, Create Icon, Create In-World Text, Play Effect, and Start Forcing Player Outlines now accept Color Values and support options for Color Value Reevaluation
Added Black, Gray, Rose, and Violet color options
Added a new option to the Apply Impulse action allowing horizontal and vertical velocity to be modified together (instead of each considered separately) when canceling contrary motion
New Workshop Actions
Log to Inspector
Wait Until
Set Knockback Dealt
Set Knockback Received
Set Environment Credit Player
Start Assist
Stop Assist
Stop All Assists
Create Progress Bar HUD Text
Destroy Progress Bar HUD Text
Destroy All Progress Bar HUD Text
Create Progress Bar In-World Text
Destroy Progress Bar In-World Text
Destroy All Progress Bar In-World Text
New Workshop Values
Color
Custom Color
Workshop Setting Combo
Workshop Setting Hero
Evaluate Once
Update Every Frame
Magnitude Of
Number of Slots
Spawn Points
String Contains
String Length
String Slice
Last Assist ID
Is Communicating Any Spray
Player Stat (limited to current match stats)
Player Hero Stat (limited to current match stats)
Evaluate Once can be used to isolate a part of a reevaluating parameter and "freeze" it at its initial value. One way this can be useful is when a reevaluating parameter (such as an effect's position) makes use of a For loop's control variable. For example, if you want to create a vertical stack of effects that move with a player, you could loop over a Create Effect action using Global.Y as your control variable and "Position Of(Event Player) + Vector(0, Evaluate Once(Global.Y), 0)" as your position (with reevaluation enabled). Doing this, the position of each effect would move along with the player, but thanks to Evaluate Once, the vertical offset for each effect would be frozen to the value of Global.Y when that particular effect was created (instead of the final value of Global.Y when the loop ends).
Update Every Frame increases the rate at which certain values will update. For example, "Position Of(...)" only updates 12.5 times per second, but "Update Every Frame(Position Of(...))" will evaluate 62.5 times per second for conditions and other logical checks and as fast as your framerate for visual output, such as effects and camera. This value can be used to create highly sensitive positional triggers and smooth movement for effects and camera work. Depending on your usage, this value could have a significant impact on server load, framerate, or both, so use it only when needed. That said, executing a single condition or action that contains an Update Every Frame is still much more performant than repeatedly executing an action in a tight loop to try and achieve the same result.
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug with Capture the Flag that caused the overhead flag to not appear properly during sudden death
Heroes
Hanzo
Fixed a bug that caused an animation issue with his Hero Select animation
Pharah
Fixed a bug that caused Pharah's eyes to face the wrong direction in her HUD portrait when equipping the Lifeguard skin
Workshop
Fixed a crash that could occur when swapping the parent/child relationship between two players (using the Attach Players action)
Fixed a bug where Disable Messages was also disabling messages sent from Workshop (e.g. Small Message and Big Message)
Fixed a bug where setting multiple Ability Cooldowns within the same frame could fail
Fixed a bug where the camera override from Start Camera could be overridden from other sources (e.g. emote cameras)
Fixed a bug where Wrecking Ball could leave from ball form even if the Ability 1 and Primary Fire buttons were disabled
Fixed a bug where the user could lose focus when interacting with the Array Value in the editor
Fixed a bug where Set Move Speed and Set Jump Vertical Speed couldn't set the speed to 0
Fixed a bug where Declare Team Victory could fail in Elimination
Fixed a bug where the Start Camera and Chase Variable actions would not update smoothly at high framerates or during slow motion
Fixed a bug where D.Va and Echo could use their flight abilities to break away from an Attach Players action
Fixed a bug where values with redundant parentheses would fail to paste from text correctly
Fixed a bug where values with mismatched units (for example, a directional vector instead of a positional vector) would fail to paste from text correctly
Fixed a bug where the element count could be higher than expected when pasting from text
Fixed a bug where multiple 0.016-second Waits running on the same player (or the global entity) could result in some Waits taking an extra 0.016 seconds to complete
Fixed a bug where the Phased Out status behaved inconsistently when applied to a dead player (since Phased Out and Dead are mutually exclusive)
Fixed a bug where a Set variable action (not a Modify) would behave incorrectly when a previously-Chased variable was on both the left and right side (such as Global.A = 1 - Global.A)
Fixed a bug where a player's current health would be incorrectly limited to the player's original max health between executions of multiple Set Max Health actions
September 23
GENERAL UPDATES
Feature Update: Improved Profanity Filter
We are making changes to how the Profanity Filter works to give players more control over the types of words they see. Instead of a simple On/Off Profanity Filter, there are now three levels of profanity filtering provided.
FRIENDLY – We’ll do our best to filter all words currently identified by our constantly-updated list as obscene, vulgar, or offensive. This is the most family-friendly setting.
MATURE – You may see some obscene or vulgar words with this setting, but we will filter language identified as extremely offensive.
UNFILTERED – Nothing will be filtered. Please be aware that you may see extremely offensive language. This setting is not recommended.
Along with the new three levels of filtering, we now will allow players to have different profanity filter settings for each communication channel. These channels include:
GENERAL CHAT
MATCH CHAT
TEAM CHAT
PARTY CHAT
WHISPER
As an example, you could use the stronger FRIENDLY profanity filter option for more public channels such as GENERAL CHAT or MATCH CHAT, but use the MATURE option for the more private PARTY CHAT.
PLEASE NOTE: Using Any of the profanity filters doesn’t make it okay for players to use offensive language, and we encourage you to report these examples if you encounter them.
See Blizzard Entertainment’s In-Game-Code of Conduct for more information on acceptable behavior. Using language reported by the community and deemed offensive by Blizzard will result in severe account restrictions.
Feature Update: Elevator Adjustments
Elevators will now wait at the bottom of their track until a player boards the platform. After a short delay, the platform rises rapidly upward. Once the elevator reaches the top, it pauses briefly before returning to the bottom.
We've received quite a bit of feedback about the unreliability of the looping elevators in Hollywood and Volskaya Industries. In an effort to improve that experience, we have re-designed the elevators in both maps so that they no longer endlessly loop. We hope that this change will make elevators a quicker and more reliable form of vertical transportation, while granting nearby players fair warning that the elevator is in use through updated sound effects.
HERO UPDATES
REINHARDT
Added a voice line stating, "For the Crusaders!", that allies will hear when Reinhardt uses his ultimate ability
SOMBRA
Translocator
Improved smoothness of Sombra's First Person camera when Translocating short distances to a Translocator that is in view
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug that caused highlights saved from Experimental games to not load properly
Heroes
Baptiste
Fixed a bug that caused Baptiste's eyes to not blink during his idle animation
D.Va
Fixed a bug that caused the spray menu to display "Empty" in the top slot while a spray is equipped
Pharah
Fixed a bug with the Lifeguard skin model not displaying properly on low texture quality settings
Fixed a bug that caused Pharah's eyes to not animate properly when equipping the Lifeguard skin
Reinhardt
Fixed a bug that prevented "Storm, Earth and Fire" achievement from triggering
Wrecking Ball
Grappling Hook now has improved target detection to help connecting to walls be more consistent
Zarya
Fixed a bug that caused beam hit effects to display incorrectly on barriers
Workshop
Fixed a bug with Ashe's Dynamite in hand to not scale to the size of the projectile
Fixed a bug with Brigitte's Whip Shot not displaying properly when triggered rapidly without a cooldown
Fixed a bug that caused Reinhardt's Earthshatter to not consistently hit targets when model scale is increased
August 26
BUG FIXES
Heroes
Genji
Fixed a bug where canceling Genji's Dragonblade swings to Swift Strike could cause inconsistent application of damage at certain latencies
Fixed a bug where Genji would not move forward if using Swift Strike while aiming at a wall close in front of him
Fixed a bug where Genji could sometimes not immediately look around at the end of Swift Strike, which happened more often when dashing towards a wall or ground
Workshop
Fixed a bug that caused issues with third person spectating when scaling
Fixed a bug that caused McCree's Flashbang to not hit targets when scaled up to 20 times
Fixed a bug that caused air and ground movement speeds to differ when setting a character's movement speed to very slow
August 14
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug that caused Training Bots to not reflect buffs and debuffs on their health bars
Heroes
Echo
Fixed a bug that caused players hit by Echo’s Focusing Beam to not hear the attack sound
August 13
WORKSHOP UPDATES
The valid range for numbers stored in variables and used in mathematical expressions has been increased
New Actions
Start Scaling Players
Stop Scaling Players
Start Scaling Barriers
Stop Scaling Barriers
We're pleased to bring you the ability to scale players to very small and very large sizes, but it comes with one notable caveat: Scaling players to very large sizes and moving them into spaces where they don't easily fit can impact server load and potentially cause your instance to shut down. There are two ways to mitigate this: First, you can choose one of the Workshop maps. These are designed for experimentation and can accommodate very large players. Second, you can use the "Disable Movement Collision With Environment" action. This will cause the player to pass through walls and ceilings, though the player can still stand on floors if the "Include Floors" option is set to False. (Collision with floors does not have the same server load implications.) When in doubt, you can display the Server Load values in the HUD in order to determine how scaling is affecting server load.
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug in Deathmatch that caused the "Defeat" string to potentially display for the winning player on the Victory screen
Heroes
Ana
Fixed a bug with the "Vacation" highlight intro not animating properly
D.Va
Fixed a bug with the "Sitting" victory pose not displaying properly
Orisa
Fixed a bug with the "Medal" victory pose not displaying properly
Fixed a bug with Halt! that caused tether to break when attempting to pull at max range
Pharah
Fixed a bug with the "Barrage" highlight intro not animating correctly
Workshop
Fixed a bug that could cause the game to enter an endless match restart cycle if too many of certain actions were executed immediately on match start
Fixed a bug that could cause players to lose their bodies altogether when the "Start Forcing Player To Be Hero" action was combined with Control maps or the "Spawn As Random Hero" setting
Fixed a bug preventing automatic reloads from being disabled when disabling reloading via Workshop
Fixed a bug preventing D.Va from properly handling ammo/reload related actions/values when out of mech
Fixed a bug where strings with unicode characters could be trimmed incorrectly when copy-pasting
Fixed a bug where certain values failed to export from inspector when copying as action text
July 22
BUG FIXES
Workshop
Fixed bugs and applied stability improvements for the Workshop scaling feature
July 17
BUG FIXES
Heroes
Brigitte
Fixed a bug that caused Inspire to activate from Whip Shot environmental kills
Mercy
Fixed a bug with Guardian Angel speed after triggering the Valkyrie ultimate ability
Orisa
Fixed a bug with the Medal victory pose appearing partially off-screen when viewed in the Hero Gallery
Sombra
Fixed a bug that would cause Sombra to get into a bad state if she lost her target just before Hack completes
Zenyatta
Fixed a bug that caused Zenyatta to appear to take damage at the end of his Transcendence ultimate ability
Workshop
Fixed a crash related to using certain emotes while scaled
Fixed a bug that would cause the camera to briefly look upwards when charging as Reinhardt when set to the smallest scale
Fixed a bug that caused fast charge abilities to have unreliable detection when targeting small scale entities
Fixed a bug that caused beam weapons to look strange when scaled very small
July 15
GENERAL UPDATES
New Feature: Priority Requeue for Backfilled Games
If you join a game after it has started to replace a player who has previously left, you are considered to have "backfilled" into that game. After finishing a game where you backfill, you are now granted a priority requeue the next time you queue to play. You will see a small icon on the interface to denote this status. When you queue for a game with priority requeue status, the matchmaker tries to prioritize finding an appropriate game for you. This normally results in significantly lower times waiting in queue.
Custom Games Updates
New Features
Lopsided Teams
Lopsided Teams allows you to further customize how many players can be on each team in a custom game. While you are still limited to 12 players in total, you are now free to choose any number of slots on Team 1 and Team 2. For Workshop users, this affects how many dummy bots can spawn on each team. If the total number of player slots is 12, that defines how many dummy bots can spawn on each team (e.g. a 4v8 mode would allow for 4 dummy bots on one team and 8 on the other). If the total number of player slots is less than 12, additional dummy bots may be added to either team as long as the total number of players is within 12 (e.g. a 4v0 mode would allow up to 8 additional dummy bots on either team). We're excited to see what asymmetrical game modes you all come up with.
WORKSHOP UPDATES
New Actions
Set Ammo
Set Max Ammo
Set Weapon
Set Reload Enabled
Disable Game Mode HUD
Enable Game Mode HUD
Disable Game Mode In-World UI
Enable Game Mode In-World UI
Disable Hero HUD
Enable Hero HUD
Disable Kill Feed
Enabled Kill Feed
Disable Messages
Enable Messages
Disable Scoreboard
Enable Scoreboard
Set Ability Charge
Set Ability Resource
Set Jump Vertical Speed
Disable Nameplates
Enable Nameplates
Start Forcing Player Outlines
Stop Forcing Player Outlines
Start Scaling Players
Stop Scaling Players
Start Scaling Barriers
Stop Scaling Barriers
Enable Movement Collision With Environment
Disable Movement Collision With Environment
Enable Movement Collision With Players
Disable Movement Collision With Players
Start Modifying Hero Voice Lines
Stop Modifying Hero Voice Lines
Add Health Pool To Player
Remove Health Pool From Player
Remove All Health Pools From Player
Set Player Health
We're pleased to bring you the ability to scale players to very small and very large sizes, but it comes with one notable caveat: Scaling players to very large sizes and moving them into spaces where they don't easily fit can impact server load and potentially cause your instance to shut down. There are two ways to mitigate this: First, you can choose one of the Workshop maps. These are designed for experimentation and can accommodate very large players. Second, you can use the "Disable Movement Collision With Environment" action. This will cause the player to pass through walls and ceilings, though the player can still stand on floors if the "Include Floors" option is set to False. (Collision with floors does not have the same server load implications.) When in doubt, you can display the Server Load values in the HUD in order to determine how scaling is affecting server load.
New Values
Ammo
Max Ammo
Weapon
Is Reloading
Event Was Environment
Current Array Index
Input Binding String
Ability Charge
Ability Resource
Mapped Array
Workshop Setting Toggle
Workshop Setting Integer
Workshop Setting Real
Last Created Health Pool
Health of Type
Max Health of Type
The Workshop Setting values allow you to expose tunable values of your script to their own special section in the Custom Game Settings. With these settings, you can specify the min, max, default, and types of data (Integer, Real, Toggle) you'd like to expose to users. If one or more of these values are used in your script, a new autogenerated Workshop Settings card will appear in the settings menu, allowing you to tweak these value overrides prior to launching the game mode.
BUG FIXES
Heroes
Brigitte
Fixed a bug with the hero information description for Repair Pack
Moira
Fixed a bug that caused additional Biotic Orb impact VFX to become delayed if bouncing multiple times
Orisa
Fixed a bug that caused some of the VFX for Orisa's "Oh!" highlight intro to not appear properly
Pharah
Fixed a bug that caused the rocket launcher weapon to disappear in 3P if her Rocket Guitar emote is interrupted
Reinhardt
Fixed a bug that allowed two Reinhardt's to collide during Charge and not knock each other down
Sombra
Fixed a bug that could cause Hack to mispredict or appear to take longer to complete in higher latency situations
Symmetra
Fixed a bug that allowed turrets to be placed within map geometry in Junkertown
Zenyatta
Fixed a bug that caused an animation pop after casting Orb of Harmony or Orb of Discord
Workshop
Fixed a bug causing Disable Built-In Game Mode Completion to fail in Elimination
Fixed a bug causing Set Max Health to apply the percentage change to your current health unnecessarily
Fixed a bug causing pasted Conditions to count extra towards the total element count
Fixed a bug preventing Ashe's self-knockback from Coach Gun from triggering Dealt/Received Knockback Events
If the Last Of value is given an input value that is not an array, it now returns the value given to it instead of 0 (matching the behavior of First Of)
July 1
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug with the "New" player icon tag remaining in the same location after filtering
Fixed a bug with the "New" player icon tag not displaying for new icons when sorting by hero
Fixed a bug with the Career Profile screen that caused specific languages to display overlapping strings
Fixed a bug with the Career Profile screen that caused statistics strings to overlap each other
Fixed a bug with the Career Profile screen that caused the "All Competitive Seasons" option to not display in the Competitive Season drop-down menu
Fixed a bug with the FFA arcade game mode that caused 1P and 3P spectating to not function
Fixed a bug with the FFA arcade game mode that caused the Defeat screen to display for the winning team
Fixed a bug with the FFA arcade game mode not adding Replays for players within the match
Fixed a bug in Custom Games that caused Echo's primary fire sound to play too loudly when using the "No Ammunition Requirement" setting
Fixed a bug in Custom Games that caused the Deathmatch announcer voice line to incorrectly state total kills remaining if the game mode was set to a custom score
Fixed a bug with incorrect team colors displaying for the winning team after a match concludes
Fixed a bug that prevented the jump landing sound effect to play if holding down the space bar
Fixed a bug that caused loot box unlocks to not display properly for Sprays, Player Icons and Hero Portraits belonging to voice lines
Fixed a bug in Tutorial that caused training bots to not display their health bars
Fixed a bug with the Role Select screen not appearing properly on multiple main menu screens for non-group leaders
Fixed a bug in Capture the Flag that caused the contesting sound effect to not change in pitch based on the flag's proximity to the capture point
Maps
Temple of Anubis
Fixed a bug that would cause Wrecking Ball mines to become stuck inside the terrain
Heroes
Genji
Fixed a bug with the Deflect sound effect not matching the duration of the ability
Fixed a bug that would cause Genji to take projectile damage during a Deflect if too close to an enemy
Hanzo
Fixed a bug with Sonic Arrow not giving vision through walls when deflected by Genji
Wrecking Ball
Fixed a bug that allowed Wrecking Ball to grapple around in crab form under certain conditions
June 23
GENERAL UPDATES
Feature Update: Career Profile Improvements
The Career Profile page has been redesigned to provide a better, more streamlined experience when viewing player profiles. Aside from the brand new look, we’ve also added some new quality-of-life features:
Game mode play time has been added to the overview section, so you can see exactly how much time you’ve spent in modes like Competitive Play or any of the community’s creative Workshop modes
Statistics are displayed in a tabular format, separated by “Average/10 min”, “Best”, “Total”, providing a cleaner, more readable view
Your in-game achievements are grouped by category, and can be filtered by what you’ve earned and have yet to unlock
Your Player Icons are now grouped by category and can be filtered by hero and whether you own them
General
Capture the Flag in-game achievements have been moved to the Maps category
Added additional playback languages for Echo’s Duplicate ability video
HERO UPDATES
JUNKRAT
Concussion Mine
Trigger delay reduced from 0.156 to 0.1 seconds
RIP-Tire
Time to take control of Junkrat post detonation has been reduced from 1.5 to 0.9 seconds
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug where the Heavy Jump Land sound would not play under specific circumstances
Fixed a bug with the Role Select screen not appearing on various main menu screens for non-group leaders
Fixed a bug with spectator functionality in FFA not working properly in 1P and 3P
Fixed a bug with FFA matches showing Defeat for all players
Fixed a bug with the announcer voice line in Deathmatch incorrectly stating the number of kills remaining
Heroes
Ashe
Fixed a bug where the Viper can clip through the camera if Ashe is jumping and firing while aiming down her sights
D.Va
Fixed a bug where D.Va’s Micro Missiles were not being affected by damage boost abilities
Genji
Fixed a bug with Deflect where projectiles could still cause damage when deflected under specific circumstances
Wrecking Ball
Fixed a bug where Wrecking Ball could use Grappling Claw without transitioning into ball form
Fixed a bug with Minefield where some mines could become stuck inside terrain on Temple of Anubis
Workshop
Fixed a bug where Echo's primary fire sound was too loud when using the "No Ammunition Requirement" setting
May 21
WORKSHOP UPDATES
New Workshop Actions
Attach Players
Detach Players
Start Forcing Player Position
Stop Forcing Player Position
New Workshop Values
Is In Alternate Form
Is Duplicating
Hero Being Duplicated
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed a bug in which custom game settings were sometimes being reverted to default between rounds of a Control map or when causing one’s own death while Respawn as Random Hero is active
Custom games will no longer shut down due to server load issues when using Mei’s primary fire with a 0% freeze rate
Fixed a bug where custom game lobby privacy settings were reset when importing a share code
Heroes
Fixed a bug where Sombra could sometimes hack people right as they started an ability that would prevent hacking (ie Wraithform, Meteor Strike)
Workshop
Fixed a bug in which restarting a rule that was using the Wait action and then executing the same Wait action on the same frame could cause the action to wait forever
Fixed a bug in which using a chased variable for the rate or destination of the Chase action that was modifying it would cause incorrect behavior
Fixed a bug in which the final objective of an Assault, Hybrid, or Escort map could be completed when Disable Built-In Game Mode Completion was in effect
Fixed a bug in which reaching 100% distance or capture progress on the final objective of an Assault, Hybrid, or Escort map would cause endless beeping if Disable Built-In Game Mode Completion was in effect
Fixed a bug which caused the Stop Transforming Throttle action not to work
The Is Using Ultimate value now returns true when D.Va is using either of her ultimate abilities
The Is Using Ultimate value now returns true for the first few frames of Echo’s ultimate (After the first few frames, check the new Is Duplicating value)
The Is Using Ultimate value now returns true for Ashe only while B.O.B. is alive
Fixed a bug which caused the Respawn action to stop working for players that had recently been resurrected
Fixed rules with Echo as the designated hero not always executing correctly during or after her ultimate
Fixed the Is Primary Fire value sometimes returning incorrect values after Winston’s ultimate and during Hanzo’s Storm Arrow ability
The Is Using Ability 2 value no longer returns true for Widowmaker if her only existing Venom Mine has been fired off the map
Fixed a bug where script error messages remained on screens for certain subroutine errors even after fixing the issue in the editor
Fixed a bug preventing Set Objective Description from working when executed prior to the player spawning in
Fixed a bug preventing Disable Built-In Game Mode Announcer from working in certain modes
Fixed a bug preventing the Damage Over Time effects from occurring when first starting the Molten Floor Workshop Preset
Fixed a bug preventing Set Match Time from being able to be used while in Assemble Heroes in CTF
Fixed a bug preventing certain abilities from triggering Dealt/Received Knockback Events (Junkrat's self-knockback from Concussive Mine, Doomfist's Rocket Punch, and Reinhardt's Rocket Hammer)
Fixed a bug preventing Sigma's Ultimate Ability from working properly when gravity settings were altered via Workshop or Custom Game Settings
Fixed a bug preventing the names of Dummy Bots from properly showing up in Kill Cams, POTGs, and End of Match Summaries
Fixed a bug where Destroy All Dummy Bots failed to work in certain scenarios
May 1
Bug Fixes
General
Fixed a bug that could cause the "While You Wait" UI to become unresponsive
Patch Notes Button - Fixed a bug that could cause the "New" tag to remain after patch notes have been viewed
Heroes
Echo
Fixed a bug where Sticky Bombs could sometimes deal damage through shields
Mei
Fixed interactions between friendly Mei's Cryo-Freeze and various abilities
April 28
General Updates
Custom Games Updates
Custom Game Filter - Changed the custom game filter "Only Show Games with Space For Party" in 2 ways:
The names have been changed to be more descriptive: "on" is now "room in game" and "include in queue" is now "room in lobby". "off" is still "off"
The filter's default has been changed to "room in game" (previously "on") instead of "off"
Bug Fixes
General
Fixed a crash on game startup for users with graphics cards with DirectX support up to 10.1
Fixed a bug that caused per-hero Friendly Outline settings to not apply properly in some cases
Heroes
Baptiste
Fixed a bug where people could stand on immortality field
Doomfist
Fixed a bug where Doomfist's Seismic Slam targeting reticle was briefly visible to other players
Fixed a bug where Doomfist could still get slightly shoved by enemies knocked around by Seismic Slam
Holding secondary ability will now also trigger the ground version of Seismic Slam when it becomes valid
Fixed a bug where sometimes Seismic Slam would not trigger if Doomfist was on a slippery surface
Echo
Fixed a bug where the Hacked effect on health packs that were hacked by an Echo duplicating a Sombra would be colored wrong after her ultimate ended
Genji
Fixed a bug where Genji did not receive credit for kills done by a deflected Hanzo Dragonstrike
Mei
Fixed a bug where enemy Mei Icewalls would appear the incorrect color in FFA modes
Mercy
Fixed a bug where Mercy could lose ult charge in custom games with a damage scalar under 100%
Torbjörn
Fixed a bug allowing turrets to be teleported into invalid locations in rare instances
April 24
General Updates
General
Improved Communications Wheel - We have changed how communication wheel throttling works in the game. You can use up to 3 communication wheel actions in rapid succession but there is now a delay between subsequent communications (similar to how Tracer’s blink ability works in the game)
Play of the Game - Retuned a number of scoring factors to emphasize more active participation in fights
Hero Updates
Ashe
The Viper
Now reaches maximum zoom halfway through Ashe's aim down sights, instead of at its conclusion
Doomfist
Seismic Slam
Can now hold down the Ability 2 button to use Seismic Slam as soon as able (and valid, if using the aerial version)
When landing very close or on top of enemies, the enemy will be pushed in front/away from Doomfist slightly, instead of sometimes having then end up beside/behind Doomfist
Aerial Seismic Slam no longer has a slight acceleration time, which should make it arrive at the destination more reliably
D.Va
General
Restored functionality allowing D.Va to maintain her current aim pitch when de-meching
Mei
Cryo-Freeze
Now behaves like Mei’s Ice Wall when it comes to interactions. Cryo-Freeze will block line of sight and collision in much the same way
Workshop Updates
New Features
Added nighttime versions of the Workshop Island and Workshop Expanse maps
Bug Fixes
General
Fixed a bug that prevented new communication voice lines from playing
Heroes
Doomfist
Fixed a bug where McCree's roll could cause Uppercut to not lift him to the correct height
Fixed a bug where hitting Sombra with Rocket Punch would not put hack on cooldown if she was using it at the time
Fixed an animation pop when doing an aerial slam at certain range
Echo
Fixed a bug causing Echo to be credited with a "Double Kill" on a single kill, when playing with a damage scalar > 100%
Fixed a bug where kills done by Duplicated heroes after Duplicate had ended were not counting towards the Duplicated Kills stat
April 23
General Updates
Feature Update: Improved Communications Wheel
We have added many more communication options so you can customize your interactions in Overwatch! To help you pick your favorites, go to Options -> Controls and scroll down to the Communication Wheel section. From here, you can choose from one of 26 different options for each sector of the wheel. You can change out your choices and swap around their positions within the wheel. Now, you can still tell your team “I Need Healing,” but you can also tell them you are “On My Way” so they should “Press the Attack!”
New options are now available to customize the Communications Wheel
Shortcuts are now customizable; pick from a set of 26 different communication options
Additional keybindings are now available to support more voiceover lines
Feature Update: Patch Notes in Client
Players are now be able to read about the latest changes to Overwatch from within the game. We wanted to players across all platforms to have convenient access to this information, and it’s now easier than ever to stay up-to-date.
Selecting the Patch Notes button on the main menu will display the patch notes in the client, and no longer requires a separate web browser
Patch Notes will show as “new” whenever a game update is available
General
Added buttons to Control map dropships to allow players to reset basketballs
Hero Updates
Echo
General
Reduced the height of Echo's head hit volume
Reinhardt
General
Reduced the height of Reinhardt's head hit volume, making it harder to hit him in the head from behind
Custom Games Updates
New Features
Existing Share Codes can now be re-uploaded with new Custom Game Settings (requires same original owner)
Skirmish can now override which Control Points are valid on Control Maps
Developer Comments
This should make it easier for content creators to update existing modes, even if the codes have already been shared. Note: One may also re-upload settings to a code that has expired (assuming the owner is the same), and the share code will become valid again.
Workshop Updates
New Features
Allow strings to be stored as variables
Allow no string reevaluation in Create HUD Text, Create In-World Text, and Set Objective Description
Added Player Dealt Knockback and Player Received Knockback Events
Conditions and actions are now displayed using C-style syntax. This new syntax is used when copying to text, and both new and old syntaxes are supported when pasting from text
Nulls at the end of a String or Custom String value are no longer displayed (or required when pasting from text)
Adjusted syntax coloring for conditions and actions to make it more consistent
Relaxed type restrictions, allowing boolean values (such as Compare) to be used where numbers are expected, and vice versa
Added support for the new communication types to related actions and values
New Actions
Break
Continue
Set Crouch Enabled
Set Melee Enabled
Set Jump Enabled
Declare Round Draw
Set Ability Cooldown
Cancel Primary Action
New Values
Is Meleeing
Is Jumping
Event Direction
Button
Event Ability
Ability Cooldown
Ability Icon String
Array
If-Then-Else
Bug Fixes
General
Fixed a bug that could allow voice lines from opposing teams to be heard at Hero Select screens on certain maps
Fixed a bug where some arcade game modes were not storing or displaying stats correctly
Maps
Busan
MEKA Base: Fixed a bug that allowed Sombra to traslocate to an unintended location near the capture point
Downtown: Fixed a bug that allowed Sombra to place her translocator in several unintended locations
Havana
Fixed a bug that prevented Genji and Hanzo from consistently being able to wall climb in several locations near point A
King's Row
Fixed a bug that caused Orisa's Protective Barrier to fall through the floor when deployed at a specific spot close to Point B
Heroes
Doomfist
Fixed a visual issue with Doomfist's primary fire animation while in a Graviton Surge
D.Va
Fixed a bug that caused D.Va to not gain full health when spawning into her mech in Total Mayhem
Echo
Fixed a bug where some effects caused by Duplicated heroes were not always removing themselves after 3 seconds
Fixed a bug where an Amplification Matrix wouldn't boost damage during the 3 second linger window after duplicate ended
Fixed a bug that caused a Graviton Surge created by clone Echo to stop displaying visual effects when Duplicate ends
Genji
When Genji reflects Reinhardt's firestrike, it will now swap team coloration from Reinhardt's POV
Mercy
Fixed a bug that caused player nameplates to be invisible, when Mercy's beam target is afflicted by Ana's Biotic Grenade and ally colorblind colors is enabled
Zarya
Fixed a bug where Zarya's bubble doesn't purge the visual effects of someone hit by a Venom Mine
Zenyatta
Fixed a bug that could cause a pink object to appear at the top of the screen for Zenyatta while wearing his Zen-nakji skin
Workshop
Fixed a bug where values were often being counted multiple times towards a script's total element count
March 31
Hero Updates
Echo
General
Echo's cosmetic progression content is now available to view and unlock
Bug Fixes
Heroes
Echo
Fixed a bug where Echo could reach unintended locations
March 27
Hero Updates
Echo
General
Added stats and tips
Bug Fixes
Heroes
D.Va
Fixed a bug where D.Va's aim pitch would reset when leaving her Mech
Echo
Fixed a bug where a Duplicated Supercharger would not grant damage boost after Duplicate has ended but before the Supercharger has been removed
Fixed a bug where Echo did not properly track deaths or count for eliminations
Fixed a bug where a spectator's camera may become detached from Echo when clone ends
Fixed a bug where Echo's Sticky Bombs would sometimes not play their explosion effect
Fixed a bug where Duplicated heroes would not properly reflect some custom game settings
Fixed a bug where dying to environmental damage while using Duplicate would cause kill cam to not play
Fixed a bug where dying to environmental damage while using Duplicate would cause incorrect ultimate credit for the enemy responsible
Fixed a bug where duplicate ending on a moving platform could cause Echo to be sent flying
Fixed a bug where first-person Sticky Bomb effects would not disappear if the bombs detached (ie from using Moira's Fade)
Fixed a bug where, in some cases, Echo's Duplicate ability wasn't respecting hero specific custom key bindings
Fixed a bug where cloning a Junkrat who is controlling Rip Tire would cause Echo to lose ultimate
Tracer
Fixed a bug where the Pulse Bomb's "Stuck" message would sometimes appear on the wrong target
March 25
Hero Updates
Ashe
The Viper (Secondary Fire)
Updated lever action sound to better line up with when she can shoot again
Echo
Sticky Bombs
Explosion damage reduced from 30 to 25
Duplicate
Ultimate cost increased by 16%
Bug Fixes
Heroes
Tracer
Fixed a bug where blinking mid-air could allow Tracer to move slightly vertically upward
Echo
Fixed a bug where a Duplicated hack or sleep wouldn't persist 3 seconds after the duplication ended
March 20
Hero Updates
Echo
Flight
Flight speed will now return to regular movement speed if canceled during the initial speed burst
Added the option for Hold for Flight within Echo’s hero options
Bug Fixes
General
Fixed a variety of crashes
Heroes
Tracer
Fixed a bug where Blink would sometimes not move at all
Echo
Fixed a bug where Duplicate could target enemies through barriers
March 19
New Hero: Echo (damage)
Echo is an evory robot created by Dr. Mina Liao and programmed with a rapidly adapting artificial intelligence, versatile enough to fill multiple battlefield combat roles. Having joined up with the Overwatch team to defend Paris against the Null Sector incursion, Echo is seeing action as a full-fledged member of Overwatch for the first time. Echo fires three shots (Tri-Shot) at once, in a triangle pattern. Echo fires a volley of Sticky Bombs that detonates after a delay. Echo uses Flight to surge forward quickly, then can fly freely to avoid danger or maneuver to a more strategic location. Using Focusing Beam, Echo channels a beam for a few seconds, dealing very high damage to targets with less than half health, including barriers. With Duplicate, Echo targets an enemy hero and clones them, gaining all of their abilities and potentially changing a team fight in an instant.
General Updates
New Feature: Training Partner
Within the Practice Range, use the Training Partner Spawner to create a bot of any hero on which you can test your abilities.
General
Added a "Patch Notes" button on the main menu and within the options menu. Selecting this button will open a web browser with the latest available game updates
Hero Updates
Tracer
Blink
Improved the accuracy of Tracer's blink movement such that Tracer will more likely end up where the crosshair is pointing
Developer Comments:
Tracer will now blink around and over obstacles more easily to move towards the crosshair location. For example, if you aim alongside the corner of a wall, Tracer will blink past the corner
Tracer cannot blink through a space where she otherwise cannot fit normally
Tracer cannot blink over an obstacle which she otherwise cannot jump over normally, with the jump originating from Tracer's height at the start of the blink movement
We hope that these changes to Tracer's blink will feel more responsive than before.
Bug Fixes
General
Fixed an issue preventing switching to the next hero when team spectating D.Va in Custom Games
Fixed an issue preventing Team FFA settings and some Hero settings from being pasted back into Custom Game Settings via copy-paste
Fixed a bug that could cause voice lines from opposing teams to be heard at Hero Select screens on certain maps
Fixed a bug where knockbacks were not working correctly if the target was moving down a ramp
Alt+Tab now will cancel saving a highlight, instead of causing problems with playback
Maps
Blizzard World
Fixed a bug that allowed players to stand in an unintended location between the first and second point
Busan
Fixed a bug that caused Sombra's translocator to float when thrown in certain spots
Dorado
Fixed a bug that could cause players can get stuck between the scooter and wall
Havana
Fixed a bug that could cause players to get stuck on some bushes
Hollywood
The capture area for the first capture point no longer extends outside of the visual capture boundary
Ilios
Fixed a bug that could cause players to get stuck between a wall, plant, and tree
Heroes
Mei
Fixed a bug where an already frozen enemy getting hit by Blizzard would cause the frozen visual effect to end too early
Moira
Fixed a bug that prevented Moira's Fade icon from appearing disabled when she is stunned
Workshop
Fixed an issue preventing Big Message and Small Message from displaying messages in Practice Range
February 26
General updates
New Feature: Share Replays
Since the introduction of the replay system, players have consistently asked for the ability to share those replays. We're excited to bring that functionality to you!
A replay is shared via an alphanumeric code typically 6 characters long. The code can be shared however you want: in game, on forums, over social media. Another player can input that code and watch your replay. Codes are valid until the next patch.
We have also made some improvements to the replay system.
You can pin up to 10 replays to keep until the next patch. You can unpin a replay to make room for a different replay
We track your 10 most recently imported replay codes. This allows you to watch the same imported replay again without retyping the code
There is a new note field for each replay entry. Add descriptions or notes for yourself
We eagerly await your feedback on this feature.
General Updates
In game friend requests will now only display in game once per session
RealID friend requests will only show RealID names in game if you have recently played with that player
The initial Assemble Heroes timer for games using the Assault, Hybrid, Control, and Payload game modes has been further reduced from 35 to 30 seconds
In the Assault, Payload, and Hybrid game modes for Competitive Play, when both teams complete a round of offense and have more than 2 minutes of time bank then each team’s time bank is equally reduced until one of the teams has a 2 minutes remaining
Example: If Team A completes a round of offense on Volskaya with 4:37 remaining in their time bank, and Team B completes their round on offense with 2:50 remaining, then 50 seconds is removed from each team’s timebank. This leaves the teams tied 2-2 and Team A with 3:47 remaining and Team B with 2:00 remaining
Hero updates
D.Va
Boosters
Cooldown increased from 3 to 4 seconds
Mei
Ice Wall
Cooldown increased from 10 to 13 seconds
Player collision now allows large heroes to fit through 1 pillar gaps
Sigma
Gravitic Flux
Ultimate cost reduced 10%
Soldier: 76
Helix Rockets
Cooldown reduced from 8 to 6 seconds
Bug fixes
General
Fixed a bug that could cause the "New" tag to remain on the "Player Icon" menu tab even after viewing the new icon(s)
Fixed a UI bug that could cause both teams to show 100% at the end of a Control Point map
Fixed a bug that could cause friend request "toasts" to be permanently displayed on screen when getting more than one request at a time
Fixed a bug that could cause several heroes' ultimate sounds to be silent when observing in third-person
Fixed an issue preventing replays from recording in Custom Games that start immediately
Maps
Numbani
Fixed a bug that allowed players to stand in an unintended location near the final checkpoint
Heroes
Bastion
Brick Skin: Fixed a bug that caused Bastion's brick bullets to grow in size after shooting through a Mei Ice Wall
Orisa
Fixed an issue where Orisa's Supercharger placed on Petra's breakable floors was not properly being destroyed along with the floor
Reinhardt
Fixed a bug that resulted in assisted or environment kills not being counted in Reinhardt's Charge Kills stat, if the killed player was first knocked back by Reinhardt's charge
Sigma
Fixed a bug where Sigma's Gravitic Flux animation would play even if he was slept or stunned
Sombra
Fixed a bug where Sombra's translocator placed on Petra's breakable floors was not properly being destroyed along with the floor
Workshop
Fixed an issue causing Player Joined Message to trigger multiple times when a player joined the match
Fixed an issue preventing Set Team Score/Modify Team Score from working in Assault, Hybrid, and Payload
Fixed an issue causing the editor to eat the last character of a unicode string when pasting in text
Fixed an issue preventing "Is Firing Primary" from returning true when Doomfist shoots his last bullet
Fixed an issue causing "Disallow Button" to fail to disable Reaper's Shadow Step
Renamed "Spectators" to "Non-Team Spectators" in Create HUD Text and Create In-World Text for clarity
Fixed an issue preventing the Non-Team Spectators option from working properly in Create HUD Text and Create In-World Text
February 6
Hero updates
Wrecking Ball
Piledriver
Affected players' loss of air control reduced from 1 second to 0.5 seconds
Brigitte
Repair Pack
Armor over-heal reduced from 75 armor to 50 armor
HPS decreased from 60 to 55
Symmetra
Photon Projector (Secondary Fire)
Damageincreased from 120 to 140
Widowmaker
Window’s Kiss
Full charge time for scoped shots increased from 0.83 sec to 1 sec
Bug fixes
Fixed a bug with sound occlusion that would sometimes cause sounds to be muffled more than intended when hidden behind walls
February 4
General updates
New Feature: Hero Pools
We will be introducing Hero Pools starting in Season 21 of Competitive Play. Much like Map Pools, rather than having all heroes available for play at all times, a weekly changing list of heroes will be available. The list will include the vast majority of the hero roster, with only a few being excluded during any given week. We think this feature will help keep Competitive Play interesting, as team compositions will change more frequently during a season.
It is important to note that Hero Pools is a new feature that may not last past this initial season. Throughout the season, we will be adjusting the types of Hero Pools available. In addition, it is possible we will also adjust the frequency with which they change.
General
The Game Mode selector in the Career Profile is now sorted more logically to make it easier to use
A group leader may not use the Leave as Group option while a competitive game is currently in progress
The initial Assemble Heroes timer for games using the Assault, Hybrid, Control, and Payload game modes has been reduced from 40 to 35 seconds
Mei’s Ice Wall now has a visual damaged state when under half health
Updated the interactions between all stuns (Flashbang, Earthshatter, Freeze, Sleep, Accretion) to be more consistent
Developer comment: New stuns will only replace existing stuns if their duration is longer than the time remaining on the current stun. For example, a Flashbang stun will not apply to someone who has just been Earthshattered. Note: we use the minimum guaranteed stun time for Ana sleep, which right now is 1.5 seconds (time to fall down + time to stand back up).
Workshop updates
New Workshop Features
Custom Game Maps:
Workshop Chamber
Workshop Island
Workshop Expanse
Script Diagnostics Panel
Subroutines
Developer Comment:
We’ve added the ability for rules to call subroutines (which are rules with a Subroutine event type) using the new Call Subroutine action. When a subroutine is called, execution is temporarily shifted to another rule while keeping contextual values such as Event Player, Attacker, and Victim the same. When the subroutine rule finishes or aborts, the original rule picks up where it left off. Subroutines may call other subroutines or even themselves, though we enforce a maximum depth of 1024 calls. Waits are allowed in subroutines, and if such a Wait is ever interrupted (and the interruption isn’t being ignored by the Wait), the entire call stack is aborted, and the original rule is restarted or aborted.
Subroutine rules may also be started in parallel using the Start Rule action. Unlike with the Call Subroutine action, the original rule continues execution immediately, and the subroutine rule executes on its own some time later (either on the same frame if below the original rule or on the next frame if above). As with Call Subroutine, contextual values such as Event Player, Attacker, and Victim are copied over to the subroutine rule.
Subroutine names can be added and modified using a new button at the top of the editor.
New Workshop Actions
Start Healing Modification
Stop Healing Modification
Stop All Healing Modifications
Enable Inspector Recording
Disable Inspector Recording
If
Else If
Else
While
End
For Global Variable
For Player Variable
Call Subroutine
Start Rule
Developer Comments:
To make writing logic easier, we’ve added several new flow control actions (If, Else If, Else, While, End, For Global Variable, and For Player Variable). These actions are optimized to cause minimal server load. When using them, the editor will indent to show where sections of logic start and stop. To conclude such an indented section, use the End action. When in doubt, each action has a detailed tool tip explaining how it is used. These tool tips can be displayed by hovering over the action name or by pressing the appropriate controller button.
The Enable and Disable Inspector Recording actions offer two benefits: First, they allow selective debugging of only those sections of a script that you need to study. Second, disabling recording can reduce server load, especially when setting or modifying arrays.
New Workshop Values
Event Was Health Pack
Last Healing Modification ID
Workshop Updates
Action and Condition Comments
Melee and Reload Button Options
Added Sort Order Reevaluation Options for Create HUD Text
The Skip and Skip If actions now accept 0 for the number of actions to skip (so they just go on to the next action)
A Wait action is no longer required before a Loop
Straightened Beam Effects
Set Status/Clear Status behavior merged with gameplay stuns (e.g. Clear Status can now clear a freeze that was caused by gameplay, not just a freeze set via Workshop itself)
Custom Game settings now support Copy-Paste
Workshop Optimizations
Set Global Variable
Set Player Variable
Modify Global Variable
Modify Player Variable
Set Global Variable At Index
Set Player Variable At Index
Modify Global Variable At Index
Modify Player Variable At Index
Loop
Loop If
Abort
Abort If
Skip
Skip If
Developer Comments:
Variable manipulation and flow control actions previously caused high server load, so we spent some time making them more lightweight. When combined with the new Disable Inspector Recording action, these changes may result in significant reduction in server load for Workshop modes that rely on heavy variable logic, particularly those that manipulate arrays. In light of these changes, we’re removing the restriction that requires a Wait action before a Loop, though be advised that excessive looping in a single frame can still cause server load issues, especially when using actions other than those listed above. Note that setting or modifying multiple player variables with a single action (by providing an array of players) is not optimized, nor is setting or modifying a variable that is ever used by a Chase action. Finally, keep in mind that some values (such as the Ray Cast values) can cause quite a bit of server load on their own, even if using the optimized actions above.
Bug fixes
General
Killing B.O.B no longer grants score for FFA and Team Deathmatch
Competitive Seasons are now listed in the correct order in career profile
Replay list should no longer have invisible entries
Fixed a bug where avoided teammates did not appear in the avoided teammate list if they were not also in the recent player list
Fixed a bug where the Player Outline Strength gameplay option did not adjust the opacity of player outlines
Fixed GPU temperature query on newer AMD hardware and drivers
Maps
Petra
Fixed a bug that caused Reinhardt's Earthshatter not to work correctly on Petra's collapsible floor
The breakable floor is now targetable by Reaper's Shadow Step, Symmetra's Teleporter, or Doomfist's Seismic Slam
Heroes
Ashe
Fixed a bug that could cause B.O.B's charge to end early on stairs
Junkrat
Fixed a bug where, occasionally, the explosion for Junkrat's mine would appear near the top of his head instead of on the mine
Mercy
Fixed a bug that could cause Mercy to not get a skull/hit marker on assists
Wrecking Ball
Fixed a bug that prevented Wrecking Ball's voice lines from playing when opened in lootboxes
Custom Game
Fixed an issue preventing player invites when the custom game was imported via a share code
Fixed an issue where preset slots could be overridden when saving settings from another player's custom game
Fixed an issue that allowed skirmishing friends to get into your custom game when the "Allow Skirmishers" option was disabled
Workshop
Fixed an issue where Sigma's Primary Fire was sometimes disabled when disabling Experimental Barrier via Custom Game Settings
Fixed an issue preventing Has Status from working correctly when querying the Unkillable status
Fixed an issue where scores in Deathmatch display incorrectly if the score is set to a high number via Workshop actions
Fixed an issue preventing setting scores or declaring victory in Team Deathmatch from working correctly via Workshop actions
Fixed an issue where Training Bots sometimes wouldn't respawn in Practice Range
Fixed an issue preventing the Sleep status from being interrupted early via Workshop actions
Fixed an issue with the Death Spectate actions when Enable and Disable are alternated repeatedly
Fixed an issue causing the Buff Impact sound to play twice
Fixed an issue causing the pitch (vertical) angle to be reset when using the Teleport action
Fixed an issue preventing Disable Built-In Game Mode Completion from working in certain modes
Fixed an issue where effects sometimes were the wrong size and color
January 23
Hero updates
Hanzo
Storm Arrows
Damage reduced from 70 to 60
McCree
General
Base health increased from 200 to 250
Peacekeeper (Primary Fire)
Recovery time increased from 0.42 to 0.5 seconds
Deadeye
Firing Deadeye no longer locks the player's aim
Reaper
The Reaping (Passive)
Healing amount reduced from 40% to 30% of damage dealt
Orisa
Fusion Driver (Primary Fire)
Damage reduced from 11 to 9
Fortify
Cooldown increased from 8 to 10 seconds
Halt!
Snare duration reduced from 1 to 0.65 seconds
Sigma
Hyperspheres (Primary Fire)
Range reduced from 22 to 20 meters
Gravitic Flux
Can now be interrupted before targets begin falling
Impact slow duration reduced from 0.9 to 0.6 seconds
Accretion
Explosion damage reduced from 60 to 40
Baptiste
Biotic Launcher (Primary Fire)
Recovery time increased from 0.36 to 0.45 sec
Biotic Launcher (Secondary Fire)
Heal explosion reduced from 60 to 50
January 9
Custom Game Options
The Lobby section of Custom Game Settings has a new option “Data Center Preference”. This option provides the game creator with more control over where the game will be hosted. The default “Best Available” choice automatically provides the creator with the best quality connection available to them. We only suggest choosing a specific datacenter if no single datacenter can simultaneously provide the best connection to all players. This is usually only the case when the players participating in the custom game are located in different geographic regions of the world.
Hero Updates
Baptiste
Immortality Field
Maximum duration reduced from 8 to 5 seconds
Cooldown increased from 20 to 25 seconds
Amplification Matrix
Ultimate cost increased by 20%
Mei
Endothermic Blaster (Primary Fire)
Slowing effect now reduces enemy movement speed from 20-70%, down from 30-90%
Slowing effect duration reduced from 1.5 to 1.0 second
D.Va
Boosters
Cooldown decreased from 5 to 3 seconds
Orisa
Fortify
Damage reduction reduced from 50% to 40%
Hanzo
Storm Bow (Primary Fire)
Maximum projectile speed reduced from 125 to 110
Developer Comment:
The way Hanzo arrows work is there is a base speed of 25 and it adds another bonus speed determined by how long the shot was charged up. Last patch this was 25+100 x Charge for a total maximum speed of 125. The PTR value is now 25+85 x Charge so the max speed is now 110, the same value as it was before the Hanzo rework.
Doomfist
Rising Uppercut
Recovery time increased from 0.2 to 0.5 seconds
Header image: Blizzard
